For 17 years GameFront delivered the best gaming files to an audience eager to watch, download and play trailers, games and mods. But since its closure in March 2016, we've been working hard behind the scenes to resurrect GameFront and integrate it into our grand plans for ModDB and IndieDB. Here is what we've been up too.

UPDATE: We have just started our initial rebuild efforts which you can read about here. Your assistance in helping us rebuild the file archive is greatly appreciated.

When we first heard the news of GameFront's closure we were incredibly sad and disappointed, but we understood the many challenges the site faced. At lot has changed since 1999. We no longer have to download the hottest gaming trailers in AVI format and watch them once we get our codecs in order, Youtube does that for us. Nor do we have to manually install demos, patches and gaming clients, our digital distribution program solves the hard stuff. And while epic total conversions that push boundaries like Counter-Strike and DotA once did are not as common, mods like these remain as important as ever in making new and old games great.

So that's why when we heard the news, we knew we couldn't sit by idly and let GameFront (formerly FileFront and FileLeach) once a behemoth of the gaming world, slowly fade into obscurity. After all choice, openness and preserving history are ideologies we value greatly at ModDB and IndieDB. So we began talking to Defy Media the former owner of GameFront.com and gamefront.com, and reached an agreement to acquire these domains. It is a challenge we are eager to take on, and we thank Defy Media greatly for giving us the opportunity.

Our 3 step plan

We've just taken STEP 1, once again the site is open to the entire world to upload and share files for the first time in many years. We know it doesn't contain the content it once did, but we shall persevere and encourage our community to share all the user generated content they can, so no gaming history is lost.

STEP 2, will be designing a site which strikes a balance between the powerful and detailed FileFront site of old, which also embodies many of the usability and accessibility traits common in today's websites. We consider ourselves to be power users, and aim to bring back what we believe once made the FileFront Network great. Rest assured the current design is a temporary stepping stone.

STEP 3, is ultimately up to you. Perhaps GameFront is a dinosaur and not needed. But we want to believe that there is still a community of gamers out there, who want an open gaming site, that embodies DRM free principles and allows anyone to create and share content they are working on, without restriction.

Thanks for completely failing to reach out, and totally ignoring / disregarding, the army of volunteers and community that spent over 14 years making GameFront the site it was, and went through hell and back trying to keep it alive through years of mis-management. Very classy. Cheers. You own a domain name, but you've completely failed to understand the spirit of what FileFront was. You can't, you weren't there.

I believe I reached out right at the start, and please understand this is only a few days work. Lets discuss - believe me we want to do this right as we know it was a labour of love for many within it's community. I have setup a discord, but will reach out directly to chat: Discord.gg

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"Thanks for completely failing to reach out, and totally ignoring / disregarding, the army of volunteers and community that spent over 14 years making GameFront the site it was, and went through hell and back trying to keep it alive through years of mis-management. Very classy. Cheers. You own a domain name, but you've completely failed to understand the spirit of what FileFront was. You can't, you weren't there."
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Perhaps this has been the problem with Gamefront, perhaps you and your fellow volunteers have been the problem!

One of the main reasons why I decided to pull my content from Filefront/Gamefront and make it available here on ModDB (and other places due to a vague court order which only affects ModDB and no-one else), was the thing that I have been calling the "Gamefront arrogance" which in essence meant that IF something would happen, the BLAME and FAULT was automaticly put onto a Gamefront user and NEVER on a Gamefront staffmember, no matter how low this person was in the hierarchy. This behaviour of mis-management and at certain times even abusement of privileges was noted by a lot of (former) users. Some decided to address you on that, most didn't and went elswhere. There was a discussion on this topic on JKhub but I cannot find it at the moment because of a truncated search option.

Another reason why you and your former volunteers should never, ever be reconsidered for a position in the "new" Gamefront, is your complete and total lack of respect towards the end-users in general, both on the main Gamefront site and to larger extends the former Filesnetwork sites, especially when it comes to communication and how you decided to communicate. The last time we as end-users (read: customers) recieved information about the status of the Filesnetwork sites was around April and May 2012 at the time where PotD's weren't visible anymore. During that time, I probably had the strongest voice both in public and especially through E-mail with Ian (Goody) where I used very strong words and comparisations (and yes, I still stand by them even today). As former network administrator, you had access to those mailing and/or the matter was undoubtly brought to your and your fellow network administrator's attention.

Regardsless of what you may feel about that particular comparisation, agree or disagree with other issues that I have brought forward but it DID prompt you guys to give updates on the matter, as they can be found here: Web.archive.org and here: Web.archive.org. Regrettable, that was the last time we as end-users (read: customers) were properly informed about issues before the Filesnetwork sites were taken down, which leads me to believe that those "updates" were only posted to discredit me if I had decided to take things further.

This is why I believe why former Gamefront volunteers should be kept outside at all times. ModDB deals differently with end-users then Gamefront ever did. For starters, ModDB communicates more frequently with us on a variety of topics, such as technical problems (they don't hide behind an "NDA") and what they are planning and that is a whole lot more then what I have experienced with you . . .

Pleased to hear that you respect the way ModDB has gone about things. Our community is always #1 for us, so if you ever feel that isn't the case please let me know and we will either attempt to explain or rectify the situation.

Also I think this is a good opportunity for everyone to consider a fresh start. I believe a unified front is the only way to move forward and would greatly value your input in a roundtable discussion we hope to organize soon

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Also I think this is a good opportunity for everyone to consider a fresh start. I believe a unified front is the only way to move forward ...
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I am a strong believer of that philosophy as well, however the former Gamefront staff never did. Their only philosophy was to protect their collective ***** no matter at what cost and ditch and diss everyone else who did not fell in their picture.

Take for example Filetrekker. He only came here August 30th to bitch and moan about ModDB aquiring the rights of the Gamefront name, refuses to comment on anything that has been brought forward here after that date and that includes your 'inventation' and now has closed his account here.

I seriously ask you: what is ModDB's expection from this person and other former Gamefront "staffmembers"? These people are, with all intents and purposes, layed off twice by a parent company in less then a decade.

I don't know the situation so I'd prefer not to pass judgement. But will take what you have said onboard. Personally I think the passion shown by yourself and Filetrekker is great in different ways, and ultimately we will focus on what is best for the site.

Also I think it is unfair to bring up the layoffs, GameFront/FileFront has had a turbulent past and I imagine tough decisions have had to be made along the way.

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I don't know the situation so I'd prefer not to pass judgement
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The situation in a nutshell: Most of the former Filesnetwork staffmembers were immature children who lacked any form of a long-term vision regarding Filesnetwork, then Filefront and ultimately Gamefront. This oftenly resulted in bad decisions from staff (which resulted in that you couldn't speak of the "exceptional occurrence" anymore) or NO decisions at all!

For example: the bugs that plagued the former Filesnetwork sites. For years, NO decisions was made between the moment Break Media acquired Filefront (April 2009) and the moment the former Filesnetwork sites were taken down (July 2015). For over six years, the moneypit was left intact, the water was kept running and according to Goody, it "costed them thousands of dollars each month to get it fixed". If I'm optimistic, it would've costed them 75.000 dollars. If I'm not optimistic, then it would've costed them a lot more and here is where the bad decision comes in: the moment community members (not staffmembers!) gotten vocal about this, they were labelled "troublemakers" and delt according to that vision.

The factor of "lazy" also comes to play here. Any suggestion of transferring the old sites to newly build sites (an argument Jeff Mills brought forward is that Break Media wasn't sufficient with Linux as a Windows-only company) was hammered down hard as "too much work". Why is this lazy? Because in March 2009, after the announcement that Ziff Davis would pull the plug on Filefront, many people INCLUDING staffmembers were part of initiatives in order to save as much (files, screenshots, POTD's) as possible before Break Media stepped in. Apparently it 'can' be done in March 2009 but not in, let's say March 2012.

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Also I think it is unfair to bring up the layoffs, GameFront/FileFront has had a turbulent past and I imagine tough decisions have had to be made along the way.
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Why is that unfair? Yes, Gamefront had a "turbulent past" but under no circumstances should be discarted or even ignored the fact that two parent companies decided to cut their losses (in less then a decade, no less!) because the site was not profitable. No-one in his (or her) right mind will close down or cut off a complete subsidiary that can pay their own bills and/or reels in the money. In the end of the day, Gamefront was just another company that went bust because they stood too long in the red figures, nothing more and certainly nothing less. Money is and shall always be a powerful motivator, as many people in the world of business will attest to it.

Please feel free to say your staff name. I am curious as to how you know more that the old network manager.
Filefront was simply going to be shut down by Ziff Davis and the original owners stepped up and saved it at the last minute but for some reason people thought that was a April fools joke, The the original owners tarted FN up a bit by adding a edit button to comments and flags next to peoples names. They flogged it the Break who did actually try to fix the network sites but did more harm than good and they were looking at drawing a line under the old sites and creating a new network for the new games but break merged to create the new defy media which also owns the escapist and they had a more active forum and editorial site. That coupled with a broken network it was not long before all the paid staff were moved to the escapist and the plug was pulled on FileFront. Feel free to head over there and say hello to the old paid staff and one or 2 volunteers from FF. I had already stepped down when the network was done and as my interest in FileFront was the network and its community I did not see the need to be part of that community.

Hi Ian / Goody here the former network co manager with Jeff (n0e) I always passed on any information that we had. The potd stopped working because only one server was being updated and the other 2 where not. As I remember I did make that known at every opportunity and how people could work around that. I do not recall a conversation with you but maybe you went by a different name back then. I would also like to point out a few things that you may not be aware of from that time. Gamefront or as we used to call it "the main site" was in essence a separate entity to the filesnetwork sites. NO volunteer staff worked on that part it was all paid staff. That said NO paid staff worked on the filesnetwork or forums with the exception of Jeff (n0e) The filesnetwork fell into disrepair and simply could not be fixed and even the creator of the system used could not fix them as the system used on the back end (OPS) was patched together with so many small fixes and what not that altering a small thing would sometimes crash the whole system.
Now I am sorry that you feel that the staff at the time where not good but I beg to differ. There may have been the odd one that needed a talking to and in general I would but these staff had been promised that sites would have been fixed or updated so many time that it was beyond a joke. When I took over as site manager on SoF2Files I gained access to the staff forum section and I can assure you that even then all the false promises had taken there toll on the volunteers. I am not making excuses for anyone but neither can I let such a slur against the old staff go. Every day they were abused by someone who new better or thought they were holding out or just plain lying to the customers and they where not. Yes they could not pass on certain information but that was a direct result of being told not to by the paid sections of the staff.
I was the only staff on that site for the last 2 years and was still posting files upto the last day even when the banning system had broken, the comments deleting system had broken, 2 of the servers did not update, new staff login did not work, deleting old staff did not work and so on everybody else gave up on the filesnetwork except me, Danny and Freyr.
The forums again where totally separate again as that used to be gaming forums before FileFront bought it along with Filesnetwork so it was not a surprise that it was so fractured. Did it not seem odd that you needed 3 separate accounts for supposedly one site ? and yes we were promised that all 3 user databases would be merged but filesnetworks was like everything else at the time broken.
So please do not blame the volunteers for something they had no control over and remember they like me were spending sometimes 3 hours on a evening and 8 hours a day on the weekend just for the games and the community they really loved at the time.
If you don't want to say what your old FN name was then feel free to email me @ goody10@hotmail.co.uk I am sure most people who used GF know that email addy.
Regards
Ian / Goody

If you don't want to say what your old FN name was then feel free to email me @ goody10@hotmail.co.uk I am sure most people who used GF know that email addy.
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I do not recall a conversation with you but maybe you went by a different name back then.
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Please feel free to say your staff name. I am curious as to how you know more that the old network manager.

You know damn well who I am, there is really no need to use any false pretenses over this and if you don't "recall" this conversation, then you're defintly not qualified for a position in the new Gamefront if you would every apply for one.

I always passed on any information that we had. The potd stopped working because only one server was being updated and the other 2 where not. As I remember I did make that known at every opportunity and how people could work around that.

No, you didn't. Ladies and gentelemen and ModDB staff: this is a blatant lie, as the following quote from the earlier mentioned e-mail contact will attest to that:

We release information to the public when it is required and the timing is always thought out. Because of your outburst I had to explain that timing and rebuke your comments.

This signifies that if I wasn't that vocal as I was during those days, Goody would've never, ever given ANY information about the issue and would've left the old Filesnetwork userbase (read: customers) in the dark, because again, it really didn't need three weeks to give any information on the matter. Again, ModDB deals differently with giving information because who didn't see the red flashing message about slow download speeds due to high traffic about two months ago when downloading content from ModDB?

I would also like to point out a few things that you may not be aware of from that time.

Duh !!!! If you refuse to inform your userbase in a general and timid fashion, the same userbase will of course "not be aware from that time". I really wonder how that could've happen . . . :/

The forums again where totally separate again as that used to be gaming forums before FileFront bought it along with Filesnetwork so it was not a surprise that it was so fractured. Did it not seem odd that you needed 3 separate accounts for supposedly one site ?

No, I don't find that "odd" because I know people who were only active in the Filesnetwork portion of the thing and only remained active there. There shall also be people who were only active on the forums or on the Filefront pages. I recon that a small percentage of all users combined were active on all three. Besides, having three seporate systems over one is somewhat benefitial. If one database was 'destroyed' beyond repair, it would not seep over to the other two in an event where a harddrive would fail, the system compromised (read: hacked), power outage (if the servers weren't stored in the same facility) or someone not profound enough with the system who accidently breaks the thing.

If it was one system from the get go, then I don't wanna know how it would've looked in its final days but I do stronly believe that the plug was pulled way earlier, possibly before 2009.

Gamefront or as we used to call it "the main site" was in essence a separate entity to the filesnetwork sites. NO volunteer staff worked on that part it was all paid staff. That said NO paid staff worked on the filesnetwork or forums with the exception of Jeff (n0e) The filesnetwork fell into disrepair and simply could not be fixed and even the creator of the system used could not fix them as the system used on the back end (OPS) was patched together with so many small fixes and what not that altering a small thing would sometimes crash the whole system.
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... but these staff had been promised that sites would have been fixed or updated so many time that it was beyond a joke. When I took over as site manager on SoF2Files I gained access to the staff forum section and I can assure you that even then all the false promises had taken there toll on the volunteers.
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The the original owners tarted FN up a bit by adding a edit button to comments and flags next to peoples names. They flogged it the Break who did actually try to fix the network sites but did more harm than good and they were looking at drawing a line under the old sites and creating a new network for the new games but break merged to create the new defy media which also owns the escapist and they had a more active forum and editorial site. That coupled with a broken network it was not long before all the paid staff were moved to the escapist and the plug was pulled on FileFront.

These are some quotes that signifies "the problem" and what I have said earlier here: Now that the blame cannot be shifted onto the former userbase, Goody is now pointing the acusing finger towards the (former) higher-ups. "Due to this, because of that, bla bla bla".

Once again, Goody is not taking responsibility for his own actions, especially with the earlier POTD issue that I have brought forward. It was HIS decision to remain silent until circumstances forced him to do otherwise, it had nothing to do with 'empty promises'. To some extend it can and will be contributed to a broken system but I say again, the decision to remain silent came from Goody: the independent human factor in this equasion.

The entire e-mail will be available for ModDB upon request if desired but I do say that this is a second reason why ModDB should never, ever attract former Gamefront staff. One is only ditching and dissing ModDB, the other is blatently telling lies about he "communicated" with the end-users and points the acusing finger to other people. Again, I ask ModDB what their expections are from former Gamefront "staffmembers", especially in the form of Filetrekker and Goody.

I still have no idea who you are. I have no intention of working here but you are still talking about matters you have no idea about. All of the old volunteers did there best and do not deserve this rubbish you are spouting about them. We all place a massive amount of our free time into GF for free. Not one volunteer had any access to fix any bugs and we were only given information that we where allowed to divulge. The work arounds for the bugs where worked out by us the volunteers. If you persist in trying to spread lies and hatred towards the former staff including myself then I will be forced to make a official complaint to the new owners. I am closer to 50 than 40 so I am not a child as you hinted at, I never lied to the files network visitors unlike you are doing here.

Intense can you lock this please because enough is enough. This guy started knocking the old staff and like everyone who puts themselves out there you get haters. we had old staff and clients who ended up being banned from one section of the old game front but not the other. Some of these made waves until they were perm banned. All though were always given a fair chance. This guy has made his point now it needs to stop. As for file trekker he was just upset as he and a few other of the old volunteers have invested there own money to keep the old forum and database up and running.

I come from the dark age where recent files or PoTD's were constantly changing through the day, back and forth because the site was bugged.

Files were put on hold before release because admins became inactive, others that were recently released as well as pictures were not seen as the site was so bugged, it would "switch" the frontpage version back to the the one we saw couple of days before it. Same with Hot files and Mod of the day stuff.

What use is a clone of an existing website? The content should be unique. All duplicating content across sites does is cause serious SEO damage. Secondly, saving the brand name is a lot less important than saving the files, which haven't seemingly come along for the ride, or the community.

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What use is a clone of an existing website? The content should be unique. All duplicating content across sites does is cause serious SEO damage. Secondly, saving the brand name is a lot less important than saving the files, which haven't seemingly come along for the ride, or the community.
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You can bitch and moan about this all you want but you'll be nothing other then a very sore loser. In the end of the day, you and everyone that came with it (both volunteer and paid positions) had your chance but you ruined it big time. In less then a decade, you have been laid off TWICE! First by Ziff Davis in 2009 and now by Break Media, which in my book means that you seriously did something not right there.

In both cases, if you were responsible for about 20 to 30 percent of the net profit from everything combined, then you wouldn't have been axed. Your way of doing this simply didn't get enough money in so that the site could sustain itself.

Now others (hopefully without you) are taking the Gamefront banner, perhaps to new heights or perhaps to the lowest low mankind will ever find. I don't know but it will be their responsibility as well their success or complete and total failure. Who knows but what I do know, is that the former Gamefront gang are not the people who should do it . . .

Dude clearly he put his heart and sole into making sure gamefront stayed alive for as long as it did, from what I've read it seems like it has a special place in his heart so no need to bash on him for being mad that a richer company that hasn't done much for gamefront other than take its users, note: I love moddb. But his point is that moddb is just buying the brand name and not the content, it's just another gateway for moddb to get more popularity and he feels that there not respecting it enough, I mean come it's a ******* brand. In my opinion they should've let it be.

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Dude clearly he put his heart and sole into making sure gamefront stayed alive for as long as it did, from what I've read it seems like it has a special place in his heart so no need to bash on him for being mad that a richer company that hasn't done much for gamefront other than take its users, ...
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I did not "bash" him, I did confront him with some unerasable truths. No matter how much hart and soul someone decides to put in, a bad decision remains a bad decision and every dollar (or other local currency) can only be spend once. They simply spended too much and got too little and a very harsh and drastic action is being taken, an action Gamefront has 'suffered' twice now in less then a decade.

A second argument that I wish to make here, is that Filetrekker only posted three comments here, all with the intent to bitch and moan about the move ModDB did, refuses to comment on anything else and after August 30th and now has closed his account here (last online: June 9th, 2005). So much for that "special place in his heart" . . .

While you are making a fair point about the site-clone/rename, it's a little early to be lamenting the lack of files and community, isn't it? The site's been open just a few days, there's been no time for a community, and the Moddb folks said it'd take a year or more for the new GF to really take shape.

Chill. Wait and see where this goes, perhaps with an ounce of optimism.

"But we want to believe that there is still a community of gamers out there, who want an open gaming site, that embodies DRM free principles and allows anyone to create and share content they are working on, without restriction."

So what exactly is going to set this apart from Mod/Indie DB? GameFront/FileFront were badly organized file sharing services aimed at games, Mod DB and Indie DB fulfill this role quite well now. There is a reason they went under and you did not.

FileFront was great back then because you could do large file sharing for free, now there's plenty of services that do that and like you said yourselves there is no longer a need to download something like a trailer or game patch.

What is going to make someone want to release their content on GameFront over your already established sites, Nexus Mods, or even Steam Workshop? Unless this is going to lead to another download and install management client that is strictly aimed at modding and DRM free games I can not see any kind of selling point on this.

Nexus, Workshop and GameBanana all do an awesome job of hosting mods, we agree 100%. Right now it is just early days, and we have focused on getting something running that people can upload to.

Where we see GameFront differing from ModDB, is right now our speciality is epic total conversions. Recently however there has been a massive shift towards cosmetic mods that we don't cater too well too (skins, maps etc). With GameFront we plan on making it more about the files, small and large and hopefully serve this trend a little better. I'd expect it to take us up to 12months to make this start to come together

Any possibility we might see this as a way for developers to work with you to have an alternative to Steam's Workshop?

The Workshop feature has proven to be quite the selling point on why you should buy a game like Starbound on their platform rather than the DRM free version from say Gog or Humble. Even though you can install mods on the DRM free version it has extra steps involved and requires you to manually check to make sure your mods are up to date.

Nexus of course already has their own alternative to this but it's a third party client. A library developers could integrate directly into their games would be an awesome feature to have.

We support up to 8gig, have been online without interruption since 2002 and believe if we are conservative and smart can last at least another 14years! So we encourage you to upload anything you believe should be retained!